On
the surface, Guillermo del Toro’s Pacific Rim seems like any other summer
blockbuster – full of explosions, special effects and pointless 3-D. And if
that’s all you want from Pacific Rim it delivers the goods. The film was
marketed almost as Transformers vs. Godzilla – and no one who walks into the
theater expecting that will go away disappointed. The fight sequences between
the giant robots – known as Jaegers and the reptilian or fish like monsters –
known as Kaijis – are great. Unlike Michael Bay, del Toro doesn’t get lost in
rapid fire editing, and movement for movement sake – you can always tell where
everything is in relation to each other, as del Toro is a master of special relations
in this film – something that seemingly few directors today are. But del Toro’s
film is a little bit more than a typical blockbuster – at least this summer’s
blockbusters. There is a human story that he never loses site of. And there are
moments that truly tap into the audiences fear. While the film is effective at
being a big, dumb action movie, it’s a little deeper than it first appears. It’s
still not a great film – but in a summer that has largely left me wanting more
from the blockbusters, it’s as good as we’re likely to get.

The
plot is really quite simple. It’s 2020 and 7 years ago (or in 2013 – watch out!)
a transport between dimensions was discovered deep in the Pacific ocean.
Nothing humans have can enter this “rip”, and they cannot destroy it. But the
Kaiji can get through – and they do, laying waste to coastal cities along the
Pacific ocean. With humanity on the brink of collapse, countries put aside
their differences and started the Jaeger program – essentially huge robots,
that are piloted by two men, who are mentally connected with each other – and the
robot. This was successful for years – but the Kaiji keep getting bigger, and
the Jaeger’s are no longer enough to stop them. So politicians, as they always
do, decide to abandon the Jaeger program and instead build huge walls (not
coincidentally, del Toro is originally from Mexico – although surprisingly, he doesn’t
really use these huge walls as a political point). The head of the Jaeger
program, Stacker Pentecost (Idris Elba) doesn’t like being shut down – and he
has a plan to once and for all end the war. But most of the Jaeger pilots have
been killed, and he only has a few robots left. So he calls on Raleigh Becket
(Charlie Hunnam), who was once a Jaeger pilot, but was connected to his brother
as he was killed by a Kaiji, and left the program, for one last go. He needs a
new co-pilot however – and wouldn’t the adorable and brilliant Mako Mori (Rinko
Kikuchi), haunted by her own traumatic memories, be perfect. There are only
three other teams left – one from China, one from Russia, and one from
Australia, and together, they are going to shut down the portal. How? Two
bickering geniuses Geiszler (Charlie Day) and Gottlieb (Burn Gorman) seem to
have the answer.

I’m
not going to try and argue that the movie is at all original – my anime
obsessed wife was so incensed by the preview she texted me that they were just
ripping off the old series Evangelion (she has a point), and of course del Toro
borrows liberally from old monster movies – mainly out of Japan like Godzilla
and his ilk. Giant monsters have been a staple of science fiction movies for
decades now – although you don’t see them much anymore. But del Toro, a movie
geek at heart, wanted to bring them back – bigger and better than ever before.
And he does that.

Pacific
Rim is large scale Hollywood filmmaking at its finest. The movie has all the
action anyone could ever want – and it’s handled with skill – and the special
effects are probably the best I have seen in a movie so far this year. I’m on
record as not being a fan of 3-D (I avoid it when I can, which I couldn’t this
time) – but I will say that while I didn’t see much of a point to the 3-D here –
it didn’t really enhance anything, except in a few, quiet moments – it doesn’t really
detract from the movie either. And with 3-D, that’s pretty much the best we can
expect.

The
movie snuck up on me though, to the point where I didn’t really realized how
involved I was – how much I cared about the characters – until fairly late in
the movie. True, Hunnam’s Becket is a kind of one-dimensional hero with a
tortured past – but he plays it well. Day provides quite a bit of comic relief
in his role – especially when paired with Ron Perelman who has a great moment
that will remind some of Deep Blue Sea. Most of the rest of the cast does what
is required of them, and little more. The two standouts however and Kikuchi and
Elba. Kikuchi, who was marvelous in her Oscar nominated performance in Babel,
and the best thing about The Brothers Bloom, creates a real character out of
Mako – who could have easily just been the token cute girl they throw into the
movie. Here backstory – told in the film’s best sequence, which is probably the
best sequence in any blockbuster this year – truly is terrifying, even if you
can see it coming before it gets there. More surprising however is Elba – who for
much of the movie seems like a square jawed, one dimensional military man who
screams a lot. But there is a real person underneath that, which Elba nails.

I’m
not going to try and say that Pacific Rim is some sort of masterpiece – it isn’t.
Like many blockbusters, it is hampered by studio demands, who get a large say
in what goes into the movie they are spending a few hundred million making. But
del Toro plays the game better than most – delivering a movie that the studio
wants, while also making something that fits into his filmography. Del Toro is
at his best in smaller scale movies – like The Devil’s Backbone or Pan’s
Labyrinth – but when he steps in and makes a big budget, Hollywood film – like Blade
II or the original Hellboy – he makes something wholly his own. Pacific Rim
comes close to that as well. The film is fun and entertaining – big budget
filmmaking on a grand scale – both in terms of its action and special effects,
and the emotions of the movie. Out of all the big blockbusters so far this
year, Pacific Rim may just be the best.

About Me

I am an accountant, living in Brantford, ON - and although I am married and have beautiful daughter, I still find time to watch a lot of movies. This blog is mostly reviews of new movies - with other musing thrown in as well.